


Jutsu and Subterfuge

by chemistrykind



Category: Naruto
Genre: F/F, Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-15
Updated: 2020-07-15
Packaged: 2021-03-04 20:34:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,279
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25282459
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chemistrykind/pseuds/chemistrykind
Summary: "I'm not a man, but you can call me one if you want to," the masked one replied, not looking at him. "However, I may be the one to battle you in the final round. So, I won't tell you my secrets. That is the way of a ninja, isn't it?"-One of the few surviving kids from the sacking of Uzushiogakure, Uzumaki Hideyoshi is a spy for Orochimaru, assigned to take the chūnin exams with Kabuto's squad. But when he runs into shinobi from the Hidden Sound during the Forest of Death, things go pear-shaped.And he realises that his master Orochimaru will kill him as quickly as he will kill the Sound nin after his business in Konoha is done.Unfortunately, his master seems to be hellbent on kidnapping a teenager and destroying the Entire Leaf Village. And it's not easy to pass the chūnin exams when you have to foil the plans of the most evil genius the world's seen in a thousand years without him having you assassinated.-March 2020. I don't own Naruto. This is all on Wattpad, I'm crossposting here.
Relationships: Hagane Kotetsu/Kamizuki Izumo, Haruno Sakura/Yamanaka Ino, Uchiha Sasuke/Uzumaki Naruto
Kudos: 2





	1. In Kahoots With Kotetsu

Hideyoshi checked his watch.

"One o'clock exactly. Yoroi, you're actually on time for once."

The bespectacled ninja glanced at him, flexing his right hand. "There are many rookies entering this time. I was eager to... crush them."

Kabuto cast him a side glance, crossing his arms. "How untruthful of you. You were fast asleep when I knocked on your door this morning."

Yoroi grunted once, the mask over his face not giving a hint of an emotion away. "Don't get comfortable with me, Yakushi. We're only colleagues because of Lord Orochimaru, after all."

Kabuto laughed nervously, scratching the back of his head. "W-What do you mean, Yoroi? I'm just Kabuto, scared about being late and having to deal with all those scary ninja." He coughed dryly. "I do agree, though. Sasuke must have some real potential, for Lord Orochimaru to take an interest."

Hideyoshi raised his eyebrows, squirrelling his hands into his pockets as they walked. "So it's really him, then?"

"I have my suspicions," Kabuto replied elusively. "But don't make a racket about it, Hide. I get the impression we may be the only operatives who have been informed on this matter."

Hideyoshi nodded, then paused suddenly, as the staircase passed the second floor. "Hello, what's this?"

Yoroi peered over his shoulder. "A gathering of shrimps. Is that a genjutsu?"

"I'm gonna go check it out," Hideyoshi replied, hopping up to the platform.

"Hide, wait!" Kabuto called, but it was too late. "Curiosity will kill that boy one day," Hideyoshi heard him mutter to Yoroi, and the guy mumbled assent.

His arrival caused a few heads to turn, and he realised what was going on. The classroom, sign clouded with a genjutsu, was being guarded by a couple of genin, not much older than Sasuke. One had a bandana, the other with a bandaged face and two bladed weapons strapped to his back. Hideyoshi frowned.

"Hey, you," the one with a bandana barked. "Stop right there, ranga. No-one's allowed through unless you beat us." He stuck a thumb to his chest.

"Yeah," the other guy coughed, but Hideyoshi could've sworn there was a snort in there somewhere.

"Oh noooo," quailed Hideyoshi, "how will I ever take the exam now?!"

The bandaged guy completely gave up, and began giggling uncontrollably.

"Shut up!" The bandana guy hissed, elbowing him.

"I knew it." Hideyoshi grinned from ear to ear. Grabbing the bandaged guy by the arm, he pulled him close, whispering, "Kotetsu! What in the goddamn hell are you and your boyfriend doing here, you bastards?!"

The boy grinned back, punching him in the arm. "Not so loud, Hide, I'm getting paid for this." Raising his voice, he added, "And that's for grabbing my arm, you soulless ginger!"

"Oi, oi," Hideyoshi giggled, rubbing his arm where the chūnin had punched him.

"Stop wasting the brat's time, you idiot," Kabuto tutted behind him, grabbing him by the collar and hauling him off.

Hideyoshi waved a belated hand. "See you at dinner!"

Kotetsu snorted, avoiding his disapproving boyfriend's glare. "I don't know him!" He called out to the stunned crowd. "He's crazy, I swear!"

With a final sigh, Kabuto dumped him by the stairs. "Any more of this tomfoolery, Hide, and you're going to get fired."

"Sorry, I'm sorry," Hideyoshi protested, and they made their way up the last flight of stairs.

The entrance to the actual theatre was deserted, aside from a masked jōnin who barely looked up from his borderline pornographic novel. They pushed open the doors to reveal—!

An almost empty room. A few participants from Stone and Lightning, who'd had the longest journey, looked up briefly, and then returned to what they were doing. There was one rookie team present already, with a dog at their heels, but none of them were the Uchiha boy, so Hideyoshi quickly lost interest.

"All right, like we discussed," Kabuto murmured. "You two blend in, I'll get friendly with them."

Yoroi and Hideyoshi murmured assent, and then Hideyoshi shuffled into a corner, glancing around. He made a double take. Wasn't that Konoha guy a table over a chūnin? He squinted. Looked a bit like one of Kotetsu's gang, if he wasn't mistaken. Ah well. Best not to draw attention. He set about sharpening his kunai.

After an hour or so, Uchiha's group walked in, in the nick of time. Kabuto almost fell over himself in excitement. In contrast, Hideyoshi's eyes were drawn to some of the other competitors. The jinchūriki. Hideyoshi _really really_ wished the Kyūbi wasn't a village secret, because there were some things the guy should really know about housekeeping with that thing, especially in their clan.

There were other interesting developments, too. Not only was the Hyūga clan heir here, so was her cousin, Neji. Hideyoshi sympathised with the guy a little, but there was a whole mess of a history with their clan that he tried to avoid thinking about when possible.

"...Hokage!" The Nine-Tailed kid shouted.

Hideyoshi glanced around, cocking an ear. With a sudden twist, a foreign nin leapt into the air, flinging two kunai in his Kabuto's direction. The medic dodged them, but a second appeared directly before him, swinging a fist. Kabuto dodged again, but the aggressor halted their attack. With a jolt, Hideyoshi realised Kabuto's glasses had cracked. He doubled over, hurling up his lunch.

Yoroi and Hideyoshi exchanged a glance, then nodded to each other. The three nin, who had gathered themselves together before the rookies, were certainly unfamiliar, but Kabuto was refusing to heal himself, which meant he was fine. They watched carefully, however; Hideyoshi noted that the three were all from the little Sound village project Orochimaru had started last year. Of course, he had obviously neglected to tell his spies in Konoha about it, but that didn't surprise Hideyoshi; Orochimaru rarely told anyone anything.

"Better add this to your cards, man," the first aggressor sneered at Kabuto. "The three applicants from the Hidden In The Sound will all make chūnin this year!"

_Of course,_ Hideyoshi realised belatedly. They knew nothing about the Uchiha investigation, or they would have kept well away from the boy. Orochimaru must have ordered them to join the exams officially. Whether to legitimise the Sound's nationality or to keep an eye on Kabuto's team, though... well, there was no knowing.

"Shut the fuck up, all of you!"

Hideyoshi glanced up. A barrage of jōnin and chūnin appeared in a billowing of smoke, at the front of the room. Konoha's Jōnin Commander stepped forward out of them, hand up in a Seal of Confrontation.

"Thanks for waiting. I'm Ibiki Morino, your proctor for the first stage of the chūnin test."

Trained nin across the room visibly gulped. The Konoha ones looked especially nervous. Even Hideyoshi was mildly surprised that key administration staff from the village were taking time off for this exam. Ibiki's eyes shifted, and he lifted a finger.

"And you, Hidden Sound ninja. Don't step out of line."

The masked one tilted their head. "Our apologies, we got a little carried away. It is our first time, after all."

Ibiki's eyes darkened. "I see. Let this be a public service announcement, then: violence of any kind during this period will not be tolerated without the permission of the examiner. Even then, fatalities are strictly prohibited." He took a step forward. "Assholes who disobey me will be disqualified. Do I make myself clear?"

There was silence. One of the Sound nin muttered something.

Ibiki dug into his pocket, pulling out a few scraps of paper. "Right. We're now going to cover some admin. Instead of your current seating, you will be allocated a place based on the number given to you."

"A paper test?!!" The Nine-Tails moaned. "Aw man."

The chūnin set off, walking around the room to deliver the numbers. Hideyoshi scanned his. 149. Right up the back, he thought, and ambled up the steps. On his right was a Hidden Rain ninja. On his left was the masked Hidden Sound ninja. Curious, he leaned over.

"Hey, you. What's the deal with that punch, man?"

"I'm not a man, but you can call me one if you want to," the masked one replied, not looking at him. "However, I may be the one to battle you in the final round. So, I won't tell you my secrets. That is the way of a ninja, isn't it?"

"Fair enough," said Hideyoshi, and turned his attention back to the head interrogator.

"Do not turn your tests over. Listen closely to what I'm about to say," Ibiki said, pulling a stick of chalk out of his pocket. "There are many rules to this test. I will write them on the board as I explain, but questions are not allowed, so pay attention."

"This test has ten questions, each worth one point. However, the test will be marked out of a total of thirty for your team of three, requiring a total of at least 15 marks. But! If one of you scores zero, your team will all fail."

"Wait a minute!" yelled a rookie from the fifth row, clearly ignoring the 'no question' rule. "Why the hell is this a team test?"

"Because you don't set the rules," Ibiki growled, not turning around. "Continuing on. We will begin with the assumption that you have scored ten points, and use a subtraction system for the following rule during the test. The third rule is thus: any persons caught cheating will suffer two points deducted for every offence. And although I hope this isn't the case, some of you many be asked to leave the examination room after five incidents."

"We'll have our eye on you, so to speak," Kotetsu added from the window. He caught Hideyoshi's eye and winked.

"Realise this." Ibiki continued darkly. "You pathetic ones who get caught are destroying yourselves. As shinobi aiming to become chūnin, be proud."

Hideyoshi cocked his head. Be proud, not subservient. Something funky was going on.

"There is a final addendum, a rule if you like," Ibiki concluded. "If you fail during the exam, your teammates will also be disqualified."

_Ah._ It hit Hideyoshi. Hiruzen knew about the international tensions ramping up recently, obviously: he was communicating to the Leaf ninja in the room that they needed to take initiative. Be discreet, of course; but the Hokage obviously suspected that something was going to go horribly wrong very soon. Hideyoshi considered this information. As far as he knew, Orochimaru had no direct plans to attack Konoha as of yet; however, his interference in Suna was obviously being felt by spies. Troublesome.

"Begin."

Hideyoshi flipped the paper. He, Kabuto, and Yoroi all had respectively very different ages and experience as shinobi. 

Kabuto was a sixth-year gēnin who had, aside from the singular incident from his past on record, graduated from the Academy at the regular age with no impressive abilities to speak of. Unofficially, he was a borderline S-ranked shinobi.

Yoroi was a mature-age nin who had taken the gēnin exam in Konoha at the age of 18 after emigrating from the northeast. All Hideyoshi knew of that last detail was that the shinobi had been part of Orochimaru's military tasked with protecting a remote laboratory in the Land of Ice.

And Hideyoshi could probably most accurately described as a somewhat gifted Academy kid. He'd graduated a couple of years early, but decided against becoming a gēnin straight away in order to resettle the ruins of Uzushiogakure with his family. And that was where he'd run into Orochimaru. Five years later, and he was back in the city of his birth, taking this exam in the place of one of his master's other pawns.

It was a shame, he thought, activating his Byakugan, that he couldn't risk answering these questions himself. The administrators in this room knew that all of the contestants were cheating - this wasn't simply a test to see how sneaky you could be about it. It was to pin down the international high-ranking spies in the room, who were smart enough to answer without cheating.

He began writing, simultaneously noticing Izumo's eyes pinned on him. Of course, the Byakugan was easy to spot once you knew what it looked like, but the chūnin was suspicious for other reasons.


	2. Traitors and Terrorists

_It was another cold winter's day in the lab, four floors below the ground. Hideyoshi wrapped his overcoat closer around him, and shut down his computer, pleased to have his blood results finally filed away. A shadow flickered behind him._

_He froze. "Hello."_

_The shadow slunk out from the doorway behind him, wielding a kunai. "Hello. Who are you, and what are you doing here without a permit?"_

_Hideyoshi swung around in his chair, rising smoothly to his feet. It was a Konoha nin, a gēnin by the looks of it._

_"I work in the technology sector," he replied evenly, producing a fake permit from an inner coat pocket. This had happened once or twice before, but the face before him was utterly unfamiliar. "Who are you? Where's your permit?"_

_The short man dropped the kunai, but not his guard. "Izumo, the patrol on Mondays," he responded, displaying a permit of his own. "I'm sorry to bother you, but I was unaware of the existence of a technology sector."_

The patrol on Mondays, _Hideyoshi considered with amusement. He hoped his gēnin squad would at least know about information security when he returned to Konoha next week._

_"Many of these lower floors are still suspected to be sources of information for missing-nin across the globe," Hideyoshi responded. He dared not breathe so much as a whisper of his employer's name. "I work with a reverse-engineering squad in hopes of tracking down their location."_

_The shinobi nodded once, then gestured to the door. "Very well. However, please be aware from now on that five o'clock is the strict closing date of the Uzu Facility. I'm afraid I'll have to ask you to leave." His eyes remained narrowed, not leaving Hideyoshi for a minute._

_"Yes, sir," Hideyoshi responded, half-mockingly._

Even now, years from their first encounter, and as mutual friends, Hideyoshi understood that Izumo did not trust him fully. It made his friendship with Kotetsu... difficult, to say the least. Lifting his eyes off his test for a moment, Hideyoshi spared a glance at his bandaged bestie by the window, scribbling something half-heartedly on his clipboard.

"Number 95!" Kotetsu called out, exasperated. "I can see your clone on the ceiling. You and your team, out!"

"Aw man," the ninja in question complained, and his teammates got to their feet wearily, punching his shoulder on the way out.

Hideyoshi set down his pen with a huff, clasping his hands behind his head. Now that he had finished putting on the pretence of cheating, he took the opportunity to doze off for a few minutes. Before he knew it, Ibiki had raised a hand, signalling the beginning of the tenth question.

"Listen up!" He roared. "Before we begin the tenth question, I will be outlining a few additional rules.

"Number one! You must first choose whether to accept or reject the taking of this question. If you choose to reject it, you will immediately lose all of your points and fail. Your teammates will fail right along with you.

"However, should you choose to accept it and fail to give the correct answer... not only will you fail, but you will be forbidden from taking part in these chūnin exams ever again."

"That's ridiculous!" The dog boy from the front rows barked. "There are people here who've been taking these exams for years!"

Ibiki glowered. "Just your rotten luck. This year, I set the rules." He addressed the room once more. "I'm being upfront. If you've got doubts, you should reject the question and reapply next year."

There was some quiet murmuring, and then Ibiki raised his hand again for silence.

"Ready? Right. Those who choose not to accept will leave the room. Wait for your number to be confirmed, then leave the room."

Hideyoshi wrinkled his nose. _'Choose not to accept?'_ Smelled like a scam. This was about whether or not you were quitting on risk assessment, not choosing not to answer a question. He wished they would've presented something like a Prisoner's Dilemma, that was always fun. Still... he glanced at Kabuto. The guy nodded, and he nodded back. As much as he wanted it, becoming chūnin wasn't their priority.

A _thunk_ from the front rows startled him.

" **Never** underestimate me!!!" The Nine-Tails kid yelled, knocking his bench back with a screech. "I don't quit, and I won't run!!"

Hideyoshi blinked.

Uzumaki wasn't done. "I'll accept your stupid question!! Even if I end up being a rookie for the rest of my life... even if I have to do it by pure stubbornness, I'll _still_ become the Hokage of this village!!"

He lifted a trembling finger to point at Ibiki.

"I'm not afraid of you!!!"

"I'll ask you one last time," Ibiki directed at him. "This is a decision that could affect the rest of your life. Quit now, whilst you still have the chance."

"I never go back on my word," Naruto grinned. "That's my nindo."

Ibiki raised an eyebrow, then looked around. He directed his gaze back at Naruto. "Good call. Everyone still here, you've just passed the first exam."

Hideyoshi breathed a sigh of relief, adjusting his collar. You could never be too sure with these things. He caught Kabuto glaring at him out of the corner of his eye and looked away guiltily. Sheesh, he was only fifteen.

Meanwhile, Ibiki had begun explaining to the crowd of confused test-takers. Well, most of them - the experienced ones had probably suspected this was coming. "There is no tenth question," Ibiki clarified, clearly unable to keep his stern expression on for any longer. He grinned. "...Beyond the whole 'accept' or 'reject' thing."

Hideyoshi sighed, ruffling the red hair over his forehead. With a crack of his neck, he put up his feet. This was going to take a while. About ten minutes later, Ibiki finally began to wrap up, only for a human cannonball to crash through the window on the left, sending tiny crystal shards rocketing around the room. Hideyoshi blinked once, squinting at the figure painstakingly setting up a massive banner of her name. He snapped his fingers. Of course! One of the curse mark subjects Orochimaru had sent back to Konoha... was it Mitarashi?

"None of you are in any position to celebrate," she declared. "I am the second chief examination officer, Mitarashi Anko!! Time's getting away, chop chop!"

Hideyoshi frowned.

"Follow me!"

He sighed. Yeah, sounded like a former Orochimaru experiment.

The two proctors threw a few angry words at each other, and then the exam was wrapped up, if somewhat unsatisfactorily.

Hideyoshi leaned over to poke the Sound nin in the shoulder. "Hey, you're interesting, tell me your name."

The kid tilted his head. "I don't know how to take that. I'm Kinuta Dosu."

Hideyoshi flashed him a smirk. "Take it however. Uzumaki Hideyoshi. Hope we run into each other again."

Dosu blinked once, and then a finger and thumb wrapped around Hideyoshi's ear, pulling him out of the chair.

"C'mon, you weirdo, let's get going," Kabuto sighed, and Hideyoshi held up his hands.

"Okay, okay, I'm coming." He winked at Dosu, and vanished along with his teammate.

First impressions are like taking exams. The experience itself feels a little surreal, but all too often you look back and think, _Holy shit. One hour on a Thursday afternoon really shaped the next three years of my life, huh._


End file.
